Budget lens for landscapes d7500

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I reckon that fewer than 25% of my lenses have been bought new, personally. Although I did buy three new ones this year, but that was because I switched to Sony E and there just wasn't the availability of pre-owned lenses that I was looking for.
 
Be careful with an ultra wide angle lens, they are not really for beginners. They are incredibly complex to use properly, otherwise you end up with incredibly boring photos where most of the picture is blue sky and green grass with zero structure. Ultra wide angle lenses are highly specific tools that see occasional use with a lot of care in composition.

If your thought process is along the lines of "I want a wider angle lens to fit more of this landscape in" then you are heading in a very bad direction. Such lenses are not about fititng more landscape into a picture, but about emphasizing perspective or getting close to a specific subject while maintaining background interest. The typically use would be to photograph a foreground subject such as an interesting rock, house, tree, elephant, combined with some midground subject (lake/forest/meadow), and a background vista (mountains, citiescape, cloudscape) but all elements need to be connected by some visual path like a river or road. This kind of composition is hard to achieve but when pulled off gives stunning results.


Otherwise I would take a general purpose lens. I think the Nikon 16-85 works well, 16-20mm on the wide end is plenty for more standard landscape work, and then 85 is also really useful. The middle ground has less value in landscape work. Longer also works well, I use a 70-200mm for a lot of landscape work, soemtimes much longer as well.
 
D.P. thanks so much that's a very informed post. I'm off to Berlin in April and wanted a wide angle for more versatality. (Maybe that's the wrong type of lens however). There will be a lot of architerctural points of interest that I simply cannot capture with my 85 prime. I've been experimenting with it, and whilst it is excellent at what I bought it for, (portrait and bokeh) I am struggling with anything much larger. I also love landscape photography and I thought the Tokina would be a great lens for that. Maybe I need to go back to the drawing board.
 
The Nikon 10-20 DX is worth a look.
Cheap and lightweight.

If you only have an 85mm lens you may just want a "normal" zoom.
D.P has a good point about ultra wide.

I'm happy with my Nikon 16-80 (2.8-4) although it's a bit expensive.

The new versions of the Nikon 18-55 kit lens are pretty good and very cheap second hand.
 
philstanbridge said:
D.P. thanks so much that's a very informed post. I'm off to Berlin in April and wanted a wide angle for more versatality. (Maybe that's the wrong type of lens however). There will be a lot of architerctural points of interest that I simply cannot capture with my 85 prime. I've been experimenting with it, and whilst it is excellent at what I bought it for, (portrait and bokeh) I am struggling with anything much larger. I also love landscape photography and I thought the Tokina would be a great lens for that. Maybe I need to go back to the drawing board.
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Not necessarily. The 11 to 16mm would give a lot more versatility with what you imply you want to do on the trip. There's plenty to experiment with.

Not discounting what DP has to say you need to decide how wide you want to go? Have a look at what everyone has been doing with a lens you think you might wish to purchase prior to buying bearing in mind you'll be using it on a crop sensor (I'm assuming) so it will not be as wide as it would otherwise be going full frame.

I think anything between 11-16 is great on a DX crop for me, especially cityscapes, interiors and landscapes involving particular points of interest etc.

Alternatively go 16mm +.
 
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philstanbridge said:
D.P. thanks so much that's a very informed post. I'm off to Berlin in April and wanted a wide angle for more versatality. (Maybe that's the wrong type of lens however). There will be a lot of architerctural points of interest that I simply cannot capture with my 85 prime. I've been experimenting with it, and whilst it is excellent at what I bought it for, (portrait and bokeh) I am struggling with anything much larger. I also love landscape photography and I thought the Tokina would be a great lens for that. Maybe I need to go back to the drawing board.
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I think a 17-50m or 16-80 type lens will work much better for you.
With an 11-16mm you will be at 16mm almost all the time and wishing you could go longer.
 
Personally I like to shoot at 35mm, find 85mm too long and I've had a 10-22mm (Canon), and wouldn't think to take just that on holiday. You'll find 11-16mm on the extreme end of things.
Tamron 17-50mm is a good shout, I've had one of those (non VC) and that was the sharpest lens I've ever owned. I've had the Sigma 17-50mm OS as well which has a better motor but sharpness wasn't as good.
 
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